Tense, aspect and time in Siouan.

[R. Rankin]

> > It looks to me as though there may be a perfect and
> > an imperfect, both derived from *?uN 'do' ultimately.  It may be that
> > only one of the two is found in a given language,

It certainly looks now as tho' both are found in Omaha-Ponca at least.  I
think John may be right that egaN as a clause final perfect marker is only
found there and not in QU, OS or KS, but I'll have to check when I get home.
There is the very widespread egaN/ekaN meaning 'like'.  John: do you derive
that particle from the same source?  Semantically it "sort of" fits.

> Also, I think the fact that the
> distinction is likely marked by particles makes it probable that the
> marking is optional

That's certainly the case with both dhaN and (eg)aN in OP and naN in QU.  It's
interesting that in the OP story of the trickster and the turkeys, which has
the perfect marker at a number of points, there are about 80% fewer time
adverbials than in my QU story, which has no perfect morphology.  There may be
differences in genre that explain some of that tho'.

--
Robert L. Rankin, Visiting Professor
Research Center for Linguistic Typology
Institute for Advanced Study
La Trobe University
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